Objective: 1969
by HidingintheTARDIS
Summary: After dealing with the Family of Blood, Martha wants to have a normal meal in a normal restaurant. Of course, with the Doctor, nothing's ever exactly normal. Taking place before, after, and during "Blink", this story explores how they ended up in the past and what they did while there.
1. Careful What You Wish For

"Hey, Doctor, do you think we could go somewhere a little more... _normal_, for once?" Martha asked as the two of them stepped back into the TARDIS.

The Doctor looked at Martha with an expression of innocence and a little bit of hurt, "Normal?"

"I mean, we're hunting lizard things, then somehow we're the ones being hunted and I end up scrubbing floors. Don't get me wrong, it was great to go see the moon landings before all that. It was brilliant! But I'd like to have a proper meal in a proper restaurant for once." Martha continued as she watched the Doctor stuff his hands into his pockets, "Please?"

The Doctor frowned a little. A proper meal in a proper restaurant? He was instantly reminded of Rose's request for chips after the two of them had seen the Earth destroyed as the sun expanded. What was wrong with humans? The TARDIS kitchen (or kitchens, actually) was/were capable of creating just about every dish imaginable. Silly humans. He supposed it was a small price to pay, a boring meal now and then. It was doubtful that Martha saw the frown, at least, since he almost instantly broke into a broad grin and sprang into action. "Right, then, where shall we go?" he questioned, even as he started turning dials and flicking switches, "Chinese food in the Ming Dynasty? The first Thanksgiving in America? That's a good one, that is. Oh, I know! There's a lovely little place I know about in France. Wonderful food, as long as you don't get caught up in the French Revolution."

Martha stood back and watched him work, "Not in the past. And, no..." she cut him off as he began to speak, "Not in the future either, Doctor. Something from my time."

This time, there was no way she could miss the flicker of disappointment that crossed his face. She supposed he wanted a new adventure to help him forget about being John Smith. She just wanted, needed, something familiar to remind her that she wasn't still stuck as a servant in a boys' boarding house. He shot her a look, shrugged once, and changed a few more controls.

The TARDIS lurched into motion. Martha couldn't be sure, but the ride seemed bumpier than usual. And noisier. Her suspicions were confirmed when the Doctor shouted something above the roar of the time engines. She couldn't make out anything but "Hang on!" That was hardly necessary. She was already clinging to the TARDIS.

Abruptly, the TARDIS stopped, the time engines wheezing to a halt. The sudden stop flung the both of them to the ground. "Doctor?" Martha questioned as she pulled herself to her feet.

"Don't blame me. I think we bounced off 2009. The readings are all strange." The Doctor, also having climbed to his feet while he was talking, paused to give the monitor a slap, "She says we're at the top of Mount Everest in the year 1101 and at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean in 2732. That can't be right. See where we are, would you?"

Martha rolled her eyes and let out a soft snort. The Doctor didn't look up from his fiddling with the controls as he muttered to himself. Shaking her head, she turned and walked towards the TARDIS doors. Opening them, she peered out cautiously and then took a few steps outside. Calling back into the TARDIS, she said, "Doctor, there's a sort of broken down house. A bunch of abandoned cars. It doesn't look like the top of the mountain or under the sea. Wait, hang on, I think I see-"

The Doctor looked up quickly when Martha was cut off. There, almost in the TARDIS, was a large stone statue. "Oh, so it's you lot! Well, you're not getting in here. I can keep my eyes open for hours. Once won a staring contest on Althelbrax by not blinking. That doesn't sound too impressive, until you know that the the Althelbraxians lack eyelids. By the third day, it was pretty intense, let me tell you." Keeping his eyes on the statue while he spoke, the Doctor made sure had his screwdriver and grabbed his coat from the railing on his way to the door.

Carefully avoiding touching the statue as he left the TARDIS, the Doctor made sure not to turn away as he turned the key in the lock. "Here we go. Allons-y!"

The Doctor blinked.


	2. Time Traveling Without a Capsule

Time travel without a capsule: it can be a killer. Literally. The shock of an abrupt temporal transfer can cause a wide variety of symptoms. For some species, it's instantly fatal. Others barely notice it. Time Lords fall somewhere at the higher end of the middle, especially when dealing with an unregulated bio-temporal transfer with no mechanical filtering.

These thoughts filled the Doctor's head as soon as he felt his stomach flip-flop, before he could even open his eyes.

******HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONK******

The Doctor opened his eyes to find himself in the middle of the road, facing a swiftly approaching car. He dove, or more appropriately, flopped out of the way. Barely making it to the sidewalk, he flopped down in a very undignified manner and retched.

"Drunk." he heard a passing man mutter to himself. Whatever. The Doctor didn't care; he was just glad that he hadn't appeared closer to that car. But why was there a car in the first place? He carefully pushed himself up so that he was sitting on the curb and could watch the traffic go by. That house was somewhat secluded, not next to a relatively busy street like this.

Temporal _and_ physical displacement? Interesting.

So then where was Martha? He hoped that she wasn't too far away. He'd have to go and find her. As soon as his stomach stopped doing gymnastics. This was worse in some ways than the time he was transmatted out of the TARDIS and onto the Game Station, and that's saying something.

Fortunately for the both of them, he wound up not having to search for Martha after all. Approximately three and a half minutes later, just as he was getting to his feet, Martha appeared. He was looking across the street at an interesting row of hedges and suddenly she appeared out of thin air, looking extremely disoriented. After he checked to make sure he wasn't about to get almost flattened again, he swiftly crossed over to greet her.

"Martha Jones! Welcome to 1969!" the Doctor said cheerfully.

"1969? What happened? Where's the TARDIS?" Martha asked, looking unwell but not nearly as bad as the Doctor had felt when he'd first arrived.

The Doctor gently nudged Martha back a couple steps, so that she was directly in front of a low wall. "Best sit down." he advised, "Time travel without a capsule will do funny things to your head. Sort of like eating a heavy meal. No running or swimming for an hour. Or is it half an hour? Maybe it's three hours. I never can remember. I think it depends on what planet you're on at the time. Now, Arcopadu, that's an interesting planet. No swimming for three days after you've eaten. It's an actual law. Can you imagine that? They lock you up if-"

"Doctor, where's the TARDIS?" Martha interrupted insistently, though she did take a seat. Her head felt like it was going to spin away and fly off.

The Doctor reached up and tugged on his left earlobe. "Weeell... It's not here. It's back in 2007!" he replied cheerfully, "But that's fine. Don't worry about it."

Martha glared up at the Doctor, "Don't worry about it? Doctor, maybe you don't age but there's no way I can wait 40 years to get back to the TARDIS!"

"38. But, really, it's fine. We just need to wait here a couple weeks and we'll be off, right as rain. No problem at all!" the Doctor replied in his normal cheerful manner. Now that his stomach wasn't trying to escape, he clearly thought that the whole thing was a wonderful adventure.

"Doctor, what are you talking about?" Martha queried, her stomach still trying to create its own personal roller coaster.

Reaching into one of his coat pockets, the Doctor pulled out something flat and held it out for Martha to see. "Remember that hatching, the lizard things? We got interrupted by that woman outside the shop? She gave me this!"

Looking at the object, Martha blinked once. "A fan? She gave you a Chinese folding fan?"

The Doctor also blinked once, looking down, "What? No! Wrong pocket. Sorry." He stuck the fan back into its original pocket and pulled a manila envelope from a different pocket, "Here we go! Instructions!"

"Instructions? Instructions for what?"

"Well, not exactly instructions. It's a bunch of notes and photographs explaining what we did, what we will do, here in 1969. Cliff Notes, if you will. If everything goes right, the TARDIS will be here in a few weeks. It'll be fun!"

Martha had been staring at the Doctor in growing disbelief as he spoke. Finally, she shook her head, "You've _got_ to be joking."

The Doctor offered the envelope to Martha again, "Not joking. Take a look."

Still, Martha didn't take the envelope. Despite everything she'd seen with the Doctor so far, this was still a little too much to take at the moment. Too much to take with a body that was still vaguely protesting having been shoved through time with no warning. "So... what do we do first?"

"We need to find somewhere to stay for a while. A base of operations, if you will."

"You brought money?" Martha asked hopefully.

Cheerfully, the Doctor replied, "You know I don't carry money."

"Great. Wonderful."

Completely missing the sarcasm in Martha's voice, the Doctor grinned, "That's the spirit!"

Although she still felt a touch unwell, Martha pushed herself to her feet and started walking towards a newsstand that she'd noticed a little way down the road. The Doctor turned and took a few steps to follow before abruptly doubling over in pain. "What's wrong?" Martha stopped and turned to face the Doctor, clearly concerned.

"Residual chroniton radiation." he explained through gritted teeth, "Time Lords are... susceptible to... certain temporal shifts..."

"But you're always traveling through time..." Martha was clearly confused as she helped the Doctor over to where she was just sitting not even a minute prior.

"That's different. Sometimes only small changes are needed to turn a medicine into poison and vice versa." The Doctor sounded almost normal again, but Martha wasn't entirely convinced. She hadn't noticed anything wrong before either.

"Poison? Doctor, is this... are you...?" Martha trailed off, worried.

The Doctor shook his head once, "Dying? I'll be right as rain shortly. Just need a little more time to adjust is all."

Still not entirely convinced, Martha nodded once. "You're going to be all right, then? Do you mind if I pop down there to see if I can get a newspaper?" She gestured at the newsagent down the road.

"No, no, I'll be fine. I'll just wait here." The Doctor flashed Martha one of his characteristic grins. At least he _looked _like he was feeling better. Martha couldn't exactly tell. Nodding, she started off down the street, pausing to look back at the Doctor every few steps. When he didn't do anything else alarming, she finally continued walking normally.

While waiting for Martha to return, the Doctor opened the manila envelope and peered inside. He'd only had a cursory glance at the contents before. Enough to tell him vaguely what to expect. He pulled out a small stack of photos and started to flip through them. This was going to be an interesting time, he was sure. He just wished the TARDIS was here. Of course, he wasn't completely unfamiliar with being stuck in a particular timeline, without the use of his TARDIS. But this was different; at least then he'd actually had the TARDIS around, even if he couldn't use it.

So intent on the photos was he that he didn't notice Martha returning, a serious frown on her face. "Doctor? Doctor? 1969, you said?"

"Mmmhmm..." the Doctor wasn't paying much attention. He was looking at a photo of a wall that needed to be painted and wallpapered. That was new!

"Then why, Doctor..." Martha held up a newspaper where he could see it, "Why does this say nineteen sixty _eight_?"


	3. It Could be Worse

"1968? No! That can't be right." The Doctor cried, snatching the paper out of Martha's startled hands. But he frowned as he skimmed the front page of the paper.

The Evening News

Thursday, June 6, 1968

25 hours after the assassin's bullet struck

BOBBY IS DEAD

"See what I mean, Doctor? 1968." Martha said firmly, with a hint of annoyance in her tone.

"So you're right." said the Doctor. He frowned, just barely, "Still, it could be worse."

Martha folded her arms across her chest and simply stared at the Doctor, "Worse? How could it be worse?"

The Doctor beamed broadly at Martha, "There was the time I promised Rose I'd take her to a concert in 1979 and we ended up in 1879. Completely wrong century. We got to meet Queen Victoria. I was even _knighted_. Can you imagine that? Me? A knight!"

Upon hearing Rose's name, Martha let out an exasperated noise and rolled her eyes. The Doctor seemed not to notice. He paused just for a moment before he continued onward, "Still, the century's right this time! And only off by a year. All things considered, that's not bad at all."

"Seriously, Doctor? A year? That packet thing you've got, does it say when we get to go home?"

"I never checked." Rifling through the papers, which really wasn't all that much, the Doctor finally shrugged, "I don't see anything as such. But no matter, allons-y!"

With one motion, the stack of papers disappeared into an inside coat pocket as he stood up and started off down the street. Martha was caught by surprise at this sudden departure. "Doctor, where are we going?"

"I just realized where we are. We're off to see a couple old friends of mine." grinned the Doctor.

Martha was still unsure about all this, but she found herself grinning as well. Sometimes, his moods were downright infectious. Maybe things weren't so bad after all.

* * *

"Your friends are _children_?" Martha asked incredulously as they approached a school. The sun was starting to set, but in the fading light, she could just make out a sign that said _Coal Hill School_. It seemed deserted, which was hardly surprising, considering the time of day.

The Doctor gave Martha a withering look. "Of course they're not children. They're teachers."

"No, but seriously, there's nobody here." Martha stated, even as she noticed him pulling his sonic screwdriver out of yet another of his mysterious pockets. The Doctor just gave her another look as he unlocked the door with the sonic screwdriver.

A few moments later and he was unlocking the school secretary's office. "We're looking for personnel files." the Doctor explained as he flicked on the lights, "Barbara Wright and Ian Chesterfield."

As the lights blinked on, they revealed a row of a half dozen filing cabinets set against one wall. Most of them were industrial gray, one was blue and one was beige. All of them, however, were the same size. Each was five drawers high and deeper than Martha's arms were long. Some of the drawers didn't even have labels on them. "You have _got_ to be joking." she stated incredulously. If she'd been asked to build the Great Wall of China from scratch, alone, her tone couldn't have been much different.

The Doctor gave Martha a confused look. "It's a bit more than I expected. If we had the TARDIS, it'd take 2 second to find her." he admitted brightly, crossing the room and tugging open a grey filing cabinet drawer, "But this shouldn't take more than a couple hours!"

Martha rolled her eyes and sighed in resignation. It was going to be a long night. As the Doctor rifled through the first drawer, she examined the filing cabinets more closely. Although half the drawers weren't labeled, there did seem to be some sort of system in place. The white cabinet bore a label that read ALUMNI, so it seemed safe to skip that one. The blue cabinet had a drawer labeled BUDGETS and another said REQUISITIONS. The grey cabinets were mainly labeled with letters of the alphabet. The Doctor was already opening another drawer when Martha decided to take her luck with an unlabeled blue drawer.

Thankfully, the folders were all neatly labeled, so there was no need to open and read each one. Still, it was nearly an hour later before Martha had worked her way through the last drawer in the blue cabinet. "I found it, Doctor, Barbara Wright!" she said triumphantly, pulling the file from the back of the drawer.

The Doctor, who had worked his way through nearly the entirety of two of the grey cabinets, grinned at her. "Brilliant! Where does she live?" he queried.

Opening the file, Martha flipped through the paperwork. There was quite a lot of it; this Barbara had apparently been working at the school for some time. "Um... It says here that she left the school at the end of the last term."

"Why would she do that?" the Doctor asked, peering over Martha's shoulder.

"How should I know? But, look." Martha said, pointing to a different sheet of paper, "There is a forwarding address here. Mrs. Ian Chester_**ton**_. I thought you said..."

The Doctor cut her off, "Well... Chesterfield, Chesterton. It _has_ been a few years since I last saw them."

"Just how many years?" Martha wondered aloud.

"Oh, just a few. But now we know where they are. Allons-y!" The Doctor left a bewildered looking Martha behind as he left the office. Hurrying to put the file down on the secretary's desk, she caught up with him as he reached the school's front door. "They were the first people I ever traveled with. The first humans, anyway." he explained, seeming not to notice Martha's hurried steps.

"I see. So, what, we just show up on their doorstep, out of the blue?"

"What's wrong with that?"

Martha shook her head, following the Doctor down the street once more. "...Nothing. Nothing at all."


	4. Unexpected Visitors

By the time they reached the steps of the house that Ian and Barbara apparently inhabited, even the Doctor was looking a little tired. For distances this far, they were both used to taking the TARDIS or some form of local transport. Of course there was always plenty of running involved in their adventures, but that was hardly the same as hiking what felt like halfway across London. However, Martha didn't have enough money for bus far, let alone a taxi, so hiking it was.

"I think they went to bed, Doctor." Martha observed, viewing the darkened windows of the bottom flat.

After looking at those same windows, he gazed up and down the street for a moment. Many of the windows in other buildings were still lit up, some with the tell-tale flicker of a telly being watched. "It's not _that_ late." he argued reaching up to tug at his earlobe, "I'm sure it'll be fine."

Before Martha could argue further, the Doctor had closed the gap and rapped sharply on the appropriate door. When that provoked no response, he looked around and found a doorbell. Although they could both hear a loud buzzing from within when the button was depressed, no lights came on and no voices were raised in protest.

Feeling increasingly out of place, standing on a strange doorstep, Martha suggested, "They went out? Now where do we go?"

Undaunted, the Doctor grinned at Martha, "Right here!" She caught a glint of silver, light reflecting on metal, as he pulled something out of his coat pocket.

"Oh no!" she argued, taking a single step backwards, "You **can't**! This is somebody's home. You can't just break in, Doctor. The school was one thing, but this... You're kidding me! You're absolutely flippin' mad, you are!"

The Doctor looked at Martha in mild confusion, "We're just going to wait inside. If you want, you can go back to the..." _TARDIS._ There was no TARDIS to go back to, not right now. The unspoken word hung heavy in the air. The Doctor cleared his throat, "Right. Inside?"

"If we end up in jail, you are _so_ going to get it." Martha pushed past the Doctor and into the darkened home.

Following her inside, the Doctor closed the door behind them. This left only the dim light that filtered in through the front curtains. "Is there a prize for going to jail? Collect enough punch cards and you get a free policeman's uniform? Doesn't sound like a very good system to me. Mind you, what better way to find people who know what the laws are than by recruiting the ones that break them?" came the Doctor's voice out of the darkness. From his tone, he seemed to be trying to deliberately tease Martha.

Fortunately, Martha had seen a lamp in the darkness of the front room, just before the door closed. She could just make out a shadow where it should be. Hands out in front, she slowly left the tiny front hall and crossed over to it while the Doctor spoke. Almost knocking it down off its tiny table, she turned it on and lit up the room. It was a modest enough place. Small. Cozy. Comfortable. The furniture looked completely outdated, but it was modern 60s decor.

Purposely not answering his questions, Martha asked one of her own as she surveyed the place, "So we're inside, now what?"

"You found the light! Brilliant!" the Doctor enthused, "Now we wait."

The Doctor entered the front room and took a seat on the sofa. After a brief hesitation, Martha sat in the arm chair. She realized that he'd pulled out the "information packet" he'd been inspecting when she'd returned with that dreadful newspaper. The newspaper itself also made a reappearance. Since he seemed to be engrossed, she decided she might as well read the newspaper. She carefully tugged it out from beneath one of the stacks that the Doctor was making on the coffee table.

All of a sudden, Martha realized that she'd dozed off. She jerked awake at the sound of murmured voices coming from outside; a man and a woman.

"I don't know why I let you drag me to the cinema."

"Admit it, you liked it."

"It was silly! You know it's not like that."

"Maybe it was silly, but I still liked it."

"Ian, you left the light on." the woman chided.

"I did not, it must've been you." the man retorted, good-naturedly.

"But I couldn't have. I was in the kitchen, remember?"

Martha noticed then that the Doctor had gotten to his feet, bouncing slightly on his heels in anticipation. She, too, stood up as she heard a key scrape in the lock. The door opened and closed, the couple still teasingly arguing over who had left the light on. The small hallway, or foyer, area hid them from view for a few moments. When they appeared in the doorway, Martha could see that the man was tall and lanky, not unlike the Doctor himself. The woman was about her height, a pillbox hat perched upon her straight brown hair.

"Ian! Barbara! Hello!" the Doctor said delightedly, clearly pleased to see the familiar faces.

Ian registered a look of shock.

Barbara screamed.


	5. Checkmate

Ian stepped protectively in front of Barbara, giving her a gentle push down the hall. "Who are you? What are you doing in here?" he demanded, "Barbara, go telephone the police."

"No, no, wait, sorry, that's not necessary!" the Doctor took a step away from Ian, raising his hands submissively, "I forgot, sorry about that. Didn't mean to scare you."

Barbara had barely moved and Martha looked between the Doctor and the couple. "I thought you said they were friends!" exclaimed Martha.

"It's been a while." the Doctor cleared his throat as he answered Martha, "Quite a while. Little things like that, easy to forget."

Ian gave Barbara another gentle nudge. "Who _are_ you?" he demanded once again.

"Oh, right, sorry! Yes!" the Doctor regained his cheerful expression, slowly lowering his hands, "This is Martha Jones. I'm the Doctor. Hello! Sorry again!"

Both Barbara and Ian startled visibly at the words "the Doctor" and they exchanged a glance. "Nobody's sick here. Barbara, go telephone." Ian said coolly. This time, Barbara retreated to being almost hidden by the doorway.

"_Doctor?_" Martha eyed the other woman, vaguely relieved that there was no telephoning of police just yet, "This was all your idea."

Half-turning to look at Martha, the Doctor reached up and tugged at his earlobe as he said, "Blimey, this is difficult. I forgot, these people have never met me. Well, they have. But not this me. They met another me entirely. I got so excited about seeing them again, it completely slipped my mind." He looked back at Ian, "But it's me, honest. Remember the TARDIS? Traveling together?"

Finally, Barbara spoke up, "You're _not_ the Doctor. You don't look anything like him!"

Nodding in agreement, Ian added, "You're entirely too young to be the Doctor."

"Oi, you have to believe me!" the Doctor protested, "What can I... I know! Remember fighting the Daleks? We fought them three times, remember that?"

This was not the right thing to say. The Doctor realized this as soon as the words were out of his mouth. Barbara retreated a half-step down the hall, only the tips of her fingers still visible to Martha and the Doctor. Ian's expression hardened, "Oh, so you must be a Dalek _robot._ What are you doing here? We have nothing you want."

"I'm not a..." the Doctor looked at Martha again, "Martha, tell them I'm not a robot!"

Martha shot the Doctor a helpless look. It wasn't like she knew these people. Why would they believe her? "He's not a robot, he's a Time Lord. He's just as alive as you or I." she tried anyway.

Ian looked at Martha in confusion, "A _what_?"

"A Time Lord from Gallifrey? With time travel and a TARDIS?" Martha replied tentatively.

Ian looked towards Barbara before returning his gaze to the strange duo in his front room. "_Our_ Doctor was a human, from the future."

The Doctor groaned, "I never said... Weeell, I did sort of give that impression. I was stupid back then, wasn't I? I always was a bit bull-headed when I was a kid."

"A kid? _Kid_?" Ian exclaimed, "Our Doctor was eighty years old, if he was a day! You're younger than I am!"

"I'm nine hundred and three now!" the Doctor retorted in frustration, "Which, you'll notice, is quite a bit more than eighty! _Ian Chesserman, I am the Doctor!_"

Martha felt entirely lost, listening to this conversation. The whole situation had spiraled entirely out of control. It had seemed like such a nice day when she woke up this morning.

Ian was silent a moment. "All right, 'Doctor'..." he said slowly, "If you _are_ the Doctor, then what did you do with _my tie_?"

The Doctor blinked once, "Your tie? I haven't done anything with your tie. You're still wearing it."

"Not this one." Ian said after a brief glance downward, "What did you do with my school tie? If you're _really_ the Doctor, you'll know."

Eight-hundred-and-some odd years was a long time to keep track of exactly what had happened to one particular tie. "Er... what color was it?" the Doctor asked weakly, stalling for time.

"Black and green." Ian stated, monotone.

"Black and green, black and green, black and gre... Oh! Oh! Oh, _yes_!" The Doctor excitedly hopped over the small coffee table and gave Martha a quick hug for no apparent reason, "_Black and green_! The acid pool on... on... wait a moment, Vortis! You were going to wash your hands in it and I stopped you! And Barbara got pulled out of the TARDIS. We had a nasty time of it there, didn't we, hmm?"

Barbara stepped back into view, a look of astonishment on her face, "Doctor, it _is_ you!"

"The one and only!" the Doctor proclaimed, triumphantly.

Ian held Barbara back, "Barbara, I don't think... It could still be a trick."

Holding out his right hand, the Doctor stepped towards the married couple, "Sir Ian of Jaffa. Always looking out for other people." As an aside, he looked back at Martha, "Knighted by Richard the Lionheart himself, Ian was."

For the first time, Martha smiled broadly, "And I thought meeting Shakespeare was impressive."

Though still not entirely convinced, Ian shook the Doctor's hand automatically. "If you _are_ the Doctor, then where's the TARDIS? What are you doing here of all places?"

Martha couldn't recall ever seeing the Doctor look embarrassed before, but he did now. "It's not here." he admitted, "We're a bit stuck. We got sent back in time, it's in two thousand and... well, nevermind that. It's in the future, so we can't get to the TARDIS. So I figured, who would be able to help? Ian and Barbara!"

"We're supposed to be in 1969." Martha added helpfully.

"It's 1968." Barbara frowned at Martha.

Ian looked at Martha, then Barbara and finally back at the Doctor, "The Dalek time machine blew up, just like the Doctor told us to do. We can't help you."

"No, no, no!" the Doctor insisted, "We're _stuck_. Here. In the past. We haven't got anywhere to stay."

"Or money." Martha added again, earning a glance from the Doctor.

"That's terrible!" Barbara exclaimed in sympathy, looking at her husband, "Maybe you could stay here for the night."

Ian frowned, "Barbara, what if they're..."

Before Ian could finish that thought, Barbara interrupted, "What if they're telling the truth? Could you really turn the Doctor away after all the adventures we've been on?"

Ian frowned further, looking at the Doctor and then fixing his gaze on Martha as he said, "But, Barbara, we can't..."

"Ian, please." Barbara said again, "I just know it's the Doctor."

Relenting, Ian turned to the Doctor once more, "Fine. You can stay. _One_ night."

"Brilliant!" the Doctor beamed, "I knew this would work!"


	6. Explanations

Barbara asked Martha if she'd help her in the kitchen, getting tea for everyone, and Martha agreed. The two men were left alone together. Ian watched the Doctor, not saying anything.

"You had better not try anything funny, _Doctor._" Ian finally broke the silence that permeated the room. His tone indicating that he still didn't quite believe that the man in front of him was who he claimed to be.

Faint laughter echoed from the kitchen as the Doctor frowned in puzzled protest, "What? You're my friends!"

"I have never laid eyes on you before in my life." Ian retorted, "And you broke in here with your..." He stopped abruptly as he realized that the women were returning from the kitchen.

"Oh, Ian! Martha here was just telling me the most wonderful story." Barbara said cheerfully, bearing the tray of tea-things, seemingly oblivious to any residual tension in the air, "She and the Doctor got to meet Shakespeare. Isn't that just marvelous?"

Only a few steps behind Barbara, Martha put in, "It wasn't _all_ wonderful. There were these aliens, these Carrionites, and we had to stop them from invading London and the whole world."

Barbara set the tray down on the coffee table and seated herself in the armchair that Martha had previously occupied. As she started to pour the tea for everyone, Ian half-sat on the arm of the chair, leaving the sofa to be shared by Martha and the Doctor.

"Shakespeare? Really?" is all Ian said in reply. His tone was almost friendly, mixed with skepticism. Neither Barbara nor Martha seemed to notice anything wrong.

As the Doctor took a cup of tea from Barbara, he added, "Don't forget Queen Elizabeth, Martha. Mind you, I could've done without those guardsmen. They shot the TARDIS! _My TARDIS_!"

"The TARDIS? They almost shot _us_." Martha retorted.

Ian cleared his throat, "Speaking of the TARDIS, if you haven't got it then exactly how did you get here? You never said."

"Oh, right, sorry, yes." the Doctor beamed. He took a sip of the hot beverage that Barbara had given him, "Love a good cup of tea! Anyway, there's this species. Weeping Angels, they're called. They look just like statues, when you can see them. When you're not looking, they can move incredibly fast. If you close your eyes for even a moment, they'll send you back in time. Feed off all the days of your life that never were. And you're stuck, can't do anything about it. Unless you've got a time machine. Which I've got. Only it's there and I'm here, so we have to wait for it to arrive. It's a bit rubbish, having to wait. I thought it'd be a quick trip. Pop back, wait a few weeks, pop home. I must've lied. That's funny, why would I do that? Here, look, see?" One of Sally Sparrow's photographs was peeking out from beneath the tea tray and the Doctor deftly plucked it free and handed it over to Ian.

Martha glared briefly at the Doctor, "I still can't believe you never said!"

"Supposed to be a quick trip, Martha. I didn't want to worry you about something so trivial."

"_Trivial_?" Martha seethed while Ian and Barbara studied the photograph together, pretending not to notice the outburst, "You could've warned me. Said something. Then maybe I wouldn't have been sent back here by that stupid Weeping Angel!"

"Martha, I'm sorry. I really am very sorry." the Doctor said sympathetically, "But it's a fixed point in time. You can't change a fixed point. Rose tried, once, and she almost destroyed half the universe."

Rose. Again with Rose. Martha let out a cry of frustration and glared sullenly over her tea at the Doctor.

The Doctor returned his attention to Ian and Barbara, who were still politely ignoring the argument. "We just need somewhere to stay for a little while, until Martha can find a job in a shop."

"Until I _what_?" Martha couldn't believe her ears. That was the last straw. The absolute final straw. She was tired and cranky and had been essentially kidnapped against her will. She was a _medical student_, not... not...

Astonishing absolutely everyone, perhaps herself most of all, Martha turned and dumped her tea over the Doctor's head before standing up and stalking out of the room.

Tea and cream dripping from his ears, the Doctor just sat there and blinked.

Barbara covered her gaping mouth with her hand.

Ian stared for a moment before laughing heartily.


End file.
